NEWS

These league match recaps leave out the personal and give you the universal point of view.

The lead-ins to these league match recaps are unparalleled in their depth, research, making THE point, and reaching all players. These are heavily edited due to space—the analogies should be clear.

    Interpreting Art

It has been said that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. The concept that each person has a different view of what is beautiful originated with the Greeks in the 3rd century BC, which is a wicked long time ago. Way before pickleball or even paddle tennis was invented. The modern version of the expression is believed to have first appeared in English in the 19th century. This may be due to some of the popular art movements during this period which included Realism, Romanticism, Symbolism, and maybe most importantly, Impressionism. Popular artists of the day were creating pieces that made the eye wonder and allow for the viewer to question exactly what they were seeing.

Another artist who always made one think was Maurits Escher. Escher was inspired by mathematics and creating an illusion that may or may not have been possible. I can tell you that if you stare at Escher’s Convex or Concave or Waterfall pieces for hours while under the influence of marijuana when you are supposed to be in class, you too can graduate college with a 2.036. This is not from personal experience of the writer, by any means, just something I heard from a friend.

So where are we and what the heck does Salvador Dali’s melting clocks have to do with last night’s paddle match? Let’s find out, shall we?

The late lines went out and what was once a masterpiece in the making became more of a finger painting by an elephant…

While the other team may have resembled Munch’s The Scream, we were a Bob Ross party scene with happy trees painted with toilet paper. That is beautiful.

Roller Coasters

A roller coaster is an elevated track that carries passengers on a train through tight turns, steep slopes, and other elements to produce a thrilling experience. This is comparable to skiing a double black diamond that a family of five has also decided to try on a whim, turning a fun day on the mountain into a case for the DSS. Roller coasters are typically built as a complete circuit, starting and ending in the same location. The first known roller coasters are believed to have originated in the mountains of Russia in the 17th century, though the New England Cannonball at Canobie Lake appears (and sounds) to be older. It is said that Catherine the Great had a roller coaster at her palace in St. Petersburg.

Roller coasters are not for the faint of heart, similar to teaching a child to drive your car or completing a FAFSA application for college. Veloxrotaphobia is the extreme fear of roller coasters. Meanwhile the enjoyment of roller coasters has been linked to a form of benign masochism, like sitting down on a Sunday afternoon for a Patriots or Giants football game. A hyper coaster is one that has a drop of at least 200 feet, while a giga coaster has a drop of at least 300 feet. Strata coasters drop 400 feet, but there are only three of those in existence. Finally, to drive home the fact that mankind as a species is hopelessly doomed by the need to go further than ever before, there is a coaster under construction in Saudi Arabia that will drop 640 feet.

So, while none of us paid for the ride, the 2024-2025 season has become a bit of a roller coaster for our team…

Weather

Few things are as integral in our daily lives as the weather. It may be the first thing we check up on welcoming a new day. We are defined by where we live in relation to the weather. One teammate is a “snowflake” during his annual winter sabbatical to Florida. Others are “hard core” for trading the Massachusetts winter for Maine and New Hampshire. The Green Bay Packers play on the frozen tundra of Lambeau Field, while Arizona is a planetary air-fryer, but it’s okay because it’s a “dry heat.” We can justify ourselves and our actions by the seasons we are in. Spring makes us feel as if we are coming back to life with the smells and the feeling of rebirth. Fall is glorious as we send kids back to school and look forward to consuming everything pumpkin spice, Summer is when we wear clothing that can no longer hide our pumpkin spice addiction.

And then there is winter, or Old Man Winter, just to make it seem angrier than the others. Winter is dark and cold and we hide in our houses covered in blankets praying the dog doesn’t pass gas because we dare not open a window. Winter has heating bills and larger electricity bills due to the lack of sunlight. Being the oddest of Earth’s inhabitants, humans north of Kentucky convince themselves every year that they actually like winter. “If there was no winter there would be no snow to hurl myself down a frozen mountain at speeds that only make it feel colder. This only costs me $150.00 a day – and this is why I love winter.” Six months later we bitch about paying $25 to park at the beach so we can lie down in the sun. Winter makes perfect sense.

Winter gives us sweatpants and dead batteries, and it also gives us paddle tennis. The season starts in the fall and runs till spring. For some the season never really ends. These are the people for whom the low bounce ball was created for.

And so, as we get ready to turn the calendar to February, it is now light past 5:00PM. Summer concerts are being advertised and we can no longer procrastinate about the boat upkeep we swore we would do before splashing in May. Yet, the paddle season is just getting good. It’s playoff time!!

Pete Quine is a better writer than paddle player, and an even better hut creature. He lives on the North Shore of Boston, and writes his recaps when he is supposed to be managing clients at a very successful investment company. He was glad to share these recaps with you. Feel free to borrow his ideas and pass them off as your own.